Having tried and failed to sell restive conservatives on plans to keep the government open without picking a fight over
National Review's Robert Costa tweets:
House GOP sources confirm: House GOP WILL soon bring a CR to floor that also defunds, thus putting pressure on Cruz & co to get thru Senate
- Robert Costa (@robertcostaNRO) September 17, 2013
House GOP ldrs basically saying, "Ok, Ted and conservative activists, if you think you can rally public behind this, get it thru Senate..."
- Robert Costa (@robertcostaNRO) September 17, 2013
"... and if you can't, you're going to have to let us use another option. But we'll play along and try this--for now."
- Robert Costa (@robertcostaNRO) September 17, 2013
I guess the idea is that House Republicans will open with a demand a defunding of Obamacare and see if Senate Democrats agree to go along. (Spoiler alert: They won't.) The question is how long Republicans have to leave this demand out there until they've officially determined the strategy isn't going to work.
Is John Boehner committing to a
How can Boehner convince conservatives that he really, really tried to defund Obamacare if he doesn't let the government get shut down, at least for a few days?
Brian Beutler, who wrote this morning that a disastrous government shutdown might be the only way to "break the fever" in the GOP caucus, is looking prescient.